Eliminating water hazard in treating oils



Feb. 28, 1933. Q, 3 BAYNE ELIMINATING WATER HAZARD IN TREATING OILSFiled April 25, 1929 Eb mg- HUN-Mao MQR Patented Feb. 28, 1933 warrenstares PATENT OFFICE-11 CHARLES D. BAYNE, OF BAYTOWN, TEXAS, ASSIGNOR'TO STANDARD OIL DEVELOPMENT COMPANY, A CORPORATION OF DELAVTAREELIMINATING WATER HAZARD IN TREATING OI LS Application filed April 25,

The purpose of this invention is to eliminate the serious hazard due tothe presence of water in commercial units for cracking or distillingpetroleum oils which has been the cause of a number of disastrousexplosions. The invention will be fully understood from the followingdescription in conjunction with the drawing.

The most usual method of cracking petroleum oils on a commercial scaleconsists of heating the oil in a series oftubes to a high temperature,introducing tl e hot feed into a digesting, zone or soaking drum inwhich most of the cracking takes place and hence conducting the liquidand vapors into a fractionating zone such as a-bubble tower. Thepressure in the heating tubes and the soaking drum is usually kept above300 lbs/square inch and the pressure in the bubble tower around 50lbs/square inch. The hot feed is ordinarily introduced into the lowerportion of the soaking drum and the liquid and vaporous products leavethrough a common line at the upper portion of the drum.

It is common practiceto steam the cracking unit before and after makinga run. After a run has been completed, the equipment is steamed toreduce the quantity of oil vapors present to such a point that the dan-'ger of'an explosive air-oil vapor mixture is V eliminated. The purposeof steaming before a run is usually twofold. First, the steam heats upthe equipment, and secondly, it lowers the oxygen content below theexplosive limit. Since the equipment is generally cold when the unit isstarted up, large quantities of steam condense during the steaming outeffected before the run. The condensed water gathers atthe low points,is trapped behind the valves, etc. The bottom portions of the soakingdrum and the bubble towerconstitute a very dangeroustrap for condensedwater. During the time the unit is being brought up to operatingcondition, this water is often covered with a layer of cold oil and doesnot vaporize until the main body of oil is at a temperature considerablyhigher than the boiling point of water so that the vaporization occurswith a sudden vehe-. mence. The pressure thereby produced is 1929.Serial No. 357,898.

in some cases higher than the soaking drum orthe'bubble tower can standand in c onse quence'bu'rsting of some part of these vessels followstogether with an explosion of the hot oil which comes into contactwithair. Sin ilar conditions may exist in various distillation equipments.

i I have inventedla'lsimple method and device byv which: the hazard ofwater gathering'at the bottomof distillationor cracking vessels duringthe starting period ofna run may be, successfully eliminated. For sakeof illustration, the method will be described in its application to thesoakingdrum. In

thisexample, the water hazard is eliminated f by directing the incomingfeed against the bottomrhead of the soaking drum in such a g waythat the"condensed water will be stirred up; Since at the beginning of the runthe recting the incoming feed against, the bottom head;

Fig, 2 is an enlarged section of the bottom portion of the soaking drumprovided with the same device; 7 r

Fig. 3 is a section similar to that of Fig. 2' showing a modified formof the device.

In Fig. 1, the character 1 designates the shell of the soaking drum, 2and 3 designate respectivelythe lower and the upper manheads. The feedis introduced through line 4 at the bottom of the drum and the liquidand vapors'leave through line 5 near. the top.

As seen in Fig. 2 in detail the feed is introduced at the bottom throughline 4, casting connection 6, T 7 and nipple 8. The

strap 9 which holds the nipple in position is. welded to the drum. Plug10 diverts the feed into the nipple which ends at the man hole. It isobvious from the figure that the water which tends to settle at thelowest point of the drum is constantly stirred up and vaporized orcarried away by the feed before dangerous quantities could accumulate.

Fig. 3 shows a somewhat modified form of the invention. The numeral 11represents a pipe of somewhat larger diameter, say 6 inches, which hasbeen cut in two and Welded to the bottom head of the drum. One end ofthe pipe 12 is closed in order to divert the feed against the manhead.

Other similar modifications may be made and the invention may be appliedto a great variety of distillation and cracking vessels as well asvessels used in the chemical or other treatment of oils in which thereis a danger of accumulation and sudden vaporization of water.

In the following claims the expression vessel for high temperaturetreatment of oil includes all vessels of cylindrical, rectangular orother shape which areused in distillation, cracking or chemicaltreatment of oil effected at a temperature above the boiling point ofwater.

I claim: 7

1. In a drum for the heat and pressure treatment of hydrocarbons,amanhead neck in the bottom of the drum of smaller diameter than thedrum and a manhead carried by the neck, and a nozzle supported withinthe drum with its inlet opening through the drum and its deliveryorificepositioned at the bottom of the drum to deliver fluid downward.- lyagainst a wall of the neck whereby any liquid in the neck is subject tobe struck'by the incoming fluid.

2. In a drum for the heat and pressure treatment of hydrocarbons, amanhead neck in the bottom of the drum of smaller diame ter than thedrum and a manhead carried by the neck, a nozzle supported within thedrum with its inlet opening through the drum and its delivery orificepositioned at the bottom of the drum above one wall of the neck todeliver fluid downwardly across the neck against the opposite wall ofthe neck tangentially t0 the manhead whereby any liquid in the neck issubject to be struck by the incomin fluid.

g CHARLES D. BAYNE.

